Transatlantic Relations

The Swiss curator Bruno Z’Graggem promotes a series of meetings on the contemporary production of video and photography in Brazil as well as in European and African countries

Between July and September, São Paulo will host five meetings part of the “Transatlantic Relations” project, created by the Swiss curator Bruno Z’Graggen, researcher of contemporary art who proposes a reflection on the current production in video and photography in Brazil as well as in European and African countries.

Researcher at the University of Lucerne, Z’Graggen runs the Video Window platform, in Zurich, where he presents and discusses pieces by Switzerland-based video artists, and since 2002 he has been researching Mozambican photography.

The meetings, hosted at different venues in São Paulo, will consist of film sessions followed by a debate with the audience. For the first event, on July 5, at 7:30 p.m., at Galeria Vermelho’s Antonio Hall, the curator presents an overview of Switzerland’s contemporary video production.

The second event, on July 20, at 8 p.m., at Galpão VB, is the exhibition of the documentary Sem flash: homenagem a Ricardo Rangel (1924–2009) [No Flash: A tribute to Ricardo Rangel (1925–2009)], directed by Z’Graggen and Angelo Sansone, about the life and work of the pioneer Mozambican photographer.

The three following events will present a selection of videos from the Videobrasil Historical Collection, in which Z’Graggen has been working as a resident researcher. The exhibitions of these works make public his analysis and criticism on the institution’s Collection, and seek to link the colonial past of Brazil and that of the European and African countries the researcher examines.

The “Transatlantic Relations” project is a partnership between Associação Cultural Videobrasil and the Pro Helvetia Swiss Arts Council, part of the Pro Helvetia in South America 2017–2020 exchange program, which seeks to promote cultural exchange and spark partnerships between Switzerland and South American countries.